Fry Me a River
by Mortal Anonymous
Summary: Starring...Pop, Mole, Petunia and Nutty! Featuring...Handy, Cub, Giggles and Cro-Marmot! It's a flood, and there're going to be casualties.


Thunder rumbled and lightning flashed through the dark clouds blanketing the sky as thick rain pelted and splattered the windows of the town café. Inside the café, a slow screen pan revealed several town members to be enjoying a hot meal, or simply being out of the weather.

Around the counter, Mole was having pancakes, Nutty was drinking directly from a syrup canister, beside him Cub was being amused by this, Pop was reading a newspaper, Giggles was sipping a hot beverage, Petunia relaxing next to her, and Cro-Marmot was standing immobile in front of a plate of eggs and bacon.

Taking a puff on his pipe, Pop moved to show Giggles his paper. He pointed to a row of five gray pictures, all portraying rain, and grumbled. Giggles, looked, nodded, and chirped a response, indicating to another picture that showed Handy building up the town dam. Apparently there was danger of a flood.

Pop made a noise that sounded like "yeesh" and turned to give the skies outside a worried look.

Giggles cooed reassuringly and gave his hand a friendly pat, tapping the picture of Handy again. Pop smiled, calming slightly.

The picture of Handy at the dam faded into the real dam, where Handy was struggling to piece sticks and concrete into a decent barrier. It wasn't easy, since the rain was keeping the concrete only semi-hard, and Handy kept dropping the sticks.

He glopped them together as best he could, however, and managed to create a decent enough addition to the structure. He administered a few final pats and stood back to admire his work. Handy beamed proudly. He'd done rather well considering he had no hands.

His pride was short-lived, unfortunately, because at that moment the clouds gave and extra loud rumble, and, Handy's face falling into an expression of meek terror, wrung themselves out like a towel.

Torrents of water gushed from the clouds, almost as if spiting Handy, and reared up in one gigantic wave rushing forward.

Handy had only milliseconds to let out a small squeak before the river exploded through the barrier he'd just completed, taking him with it.

…………………………………

At the café, heads perked as the ground beneath the diners began to shake. Pop peered around his newspaper and looked out the window again, letting out a shocked cry when he did.

As he grabbed a gleeful Cub and held him protectively, the others, with the exception of Mole, looked out the window as well, which varying levels of panicked outcry followed. Everyone cringed in anticipation of the wall of water barreling towards them's arrival.

The wall struck.

Nothing happened.

Cautiously, Giggles raised her head. Nutty glanced out the window, meeting with a vision filled solidly with blue.

Miraculously, the wave had engulfed the café, but not swept it away! A mass sigh of relief filled the room. Pop eyed the picture of Handy in his paper curiously.

Just then, his unspoken question was answered with the sudden splat of a severely water damaged and scraped up Handy against the café window. Everyone jumped, again excluding Mole.

What Mole did do, as the rest were busy staring at the disgustingly bloated corpse in the window, was dab approximately where his mouth would be under his sweater with a napkin, his meal finished, place a shiny gold coin on the counter, and then get up.

The rest noticed too late The Mole tapping his way to the door with his cane, so the collective negative outcry that rose up did nothing to stop their fate.

In flushed the water, almost instantly severing the walls from the foundation and sweeping the building tumbling away. As the café was uprooted, debris flew everywhere, and in the mess of it all, something struck the gas pipes, freeing the stove and leaking a growing brown cloud into the blue.

A little ways ahead of this, though, the group of creatures, struggling in the strong currents, managed to break the surface of the river, and luckily, ended up in the same general area.

As they were all swept away, some tried to grab for each other, some merely flailed helplessly, and Pop tried desperately to keep Cub above water. Eventually, he managed to hoist the laughing child up on his shoulders, but alas, in mere seconds, the top half of Cub's head was claimed by a low hanging tree branch.

Pop wailed with shock and mourning as he gaped at his son's spurting cranium, or rather, lack of cranium, which was spurting.

Meanwhile, Petunia had managed to grab hold of Nutty, despite the maple syrup canister he was clinging to, but they were the only pair managing to link up. Fortunately for the rest of the group, they'd been washed far enough downstream so that the water was less rapid-like, and was shallow enough so that they could see roofs.

These they clamored for. Petunia and Nutty scrambled onto one, Pop crawled onto another, still gripping Cub to him and weeping, Cro-Marmot somehow washed onto another, and Mole, somewhat befuddled, spilled his way onto yet another. He seemed not to know quite what was happening though, because he immediately began tapping his way around the rooftop questioningly.

Giggles tried valiantly to swim for a rooftop, but couldn't quite make it. Closest, Petunia leaned out to try and help her.

Just then, the clouds flashed brilliantly, and with a deafening boom, lightning crashed down and struck the water.

In an instant it ignited. Petunia and the others leapt back as the river surrounding them became solidly fire. They could also do nothing but watch as Giggles was graphically simultaneously electrocuted and burnt to a crisp. As her screams subsided and her spasming blackened corpse drifted lazily by, the others exchanged looks of sorrow, fear and confusion, not knowing how the fire had started.

Then, with a gasp, Nutty, still clutching his canister in one arm, pointed upstream. There was the great gas stove loping towards them. Comprehension dawned as it passed.

More glances were passed, and each critter moved to sit silently on their rooftop to wait for something to happen. All except for Mole, who still hadn't seemed to figure out that he was surrounded by now-flaming water.

…………………………………

Time passed. Pop sat cradling Cub's sticky remains, rocking back and forth, blood smearing on him; Petunia and Nutty sat back-to-back, Petunia clutching her knees and Nutty clutching his canister, and vibrating; Cro-Marmot stood radiating nervousness as the heat licked away at the ice surrounding him, sending beads of water slipping down his sides; Mole simply continued his rounds, tapping at one side of his roof and then another.

Nutty's eyes darted left and right. He shook. He was beginning to lose it; after all, he was surrounded! He couldn't run or jump or go anywhere.

Hoping to find solace in sugar, he opened the lid of the syrup canister and peeked inside. The copper walls glinted teasingly at him. They'd been washed clean by the flood.

Nutty let out a crazed yell, leaping up and startling Petunia. Funny eye rolling, mouth twitching, Nutty flung the canister from him, hyperventilated something that sounded like it was from sugar withdrawal, and took a flying leap at the flames.

Gasping, Petunia leapt forward and seized him round the waist, stopping him midair. He grappled to escape, but she held him fast. Acting quickly, she took one of the lollipops adorning Nutty's face and jammed it into his mouth.

Instantly, he jittered as the sweet hit his tongue, and then melted. Candy... Petunia dragged him back to the center of the roof and scolded him.

Whether or not he was listening was unclear, but at least he wouldn't be trying to commit suicide for a while.

…………………………………

More time went by, and much to everyone's dismay, the roofs were becoming increasingly burnt. Cro-Marmot was especially nervous, large dents now appearing in his ice. He was almost melted through! He was also puddling, which couldn't be good for wood...

Pop had taken to reassuring the half-headless Cub that everything was going to be ok, while eyeing the approaching weakness of the wood on which he sat.

Suddenly a loud crunch came from one of the other rooftops, and Pop's head snapped up. He caught sight of a column of flame spitting out charred bits from a large hole in the roof diagonal from his. Cro-Marmot was nowhere to be seen. Pop smiled widely and started singing joyous tunes as he rocked harder. He was nearly covered in Cub's blood.

Petunia raised an eyebrow in Pop's direction.

Mole paused in his wandering, switched directions thoughtfully, and strolled confidently onward.

…………………………………

They were starting to get bored now, very bored. Backs slumped, eyes drooped, and Mole pressed onward, growing rather irritated.

And then, just as they were starting to feel hopeless, the unbelievable sound of a helicopter came whirring through the air. Not a moment later the rescue helicopter making the noise came into view.

Petunia and Nutty's faces brightened, and Pop pointed the helicopter out excitedly to Cub.

The generic silhouette inside the copter brought the rope ladder it dangled over to Mole's rooftop, but he passed right by it. The other three started jumping and shouting at him.

Hearing their voices with a start, Mole puzzlingly turned around, found the ladder and perked instantly.

Now with him in tow, the copter maneuvered to pick up Pop; Pop latched on happily and they moved over to Petunia and Nutty, who climbed aboard just as happily. Only then they noticed that somewhere along the line part of the ladder had caught fire.

Hurriedly, the group moved to put it out. They managed, but the rope was weakened and threatened to break. Now everyone tried to convince Pop to release Cub. He refused adamantly, and a small tussle broke out. There was a jostle, a shimmy, and before anything could be done, Pop went tumbling down, still holding on tight to his son. In a poof of flame he was gone.

The three on the ladder looked down at this for a moment, before sharing a shrug and letting the copter take them away.

…………………………………

The helicopter hovered above the only dry land around. Cheering merrily, Petunia, Nutty and Mole hopped off the ladder and bounced for joy. The silhouette gave them a wave and steered off dutifully.

Settling down, the flood survivors took a glance around the small plot of above-water land they'd been shown to.

A quick zoom-out showed it to be a small patch of dirt directly below a volcano.

Promptly, the volcano proceeded to erupt.

Petunia blinked, and then let out a disappointed sigh and pulled out an umbrella. Mole and Nutty solemnly joined her under it as it was circled in on, and then the circle went to black.

-

**A sunny shower won't last an hour..!**


End file.
